The Manawatu Herald. Saturday, October 2,1909. SCHOOL AGE AND FREE PEACES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXI, Issue 488, 2 October 1909, Page 2

The Manawatu Herald. Saturday, October 2,1909. SCHOOL AGE AND FREE PEACES.

We have previously expressed the hope that an Honour’s Board will some day adorn a wall of the local State School. What has been accomplished by scholars in other schools can be accomplished in Foxton. We refuse to believe that Foxtou children are below the mental average, and we exonerate the teaching staff of any suspicion of inefficiency. Foxton has, and does now possess, enthusiastic instructors. What, in our opinion, is the cause of failure to secure scholarships, lies in the fact that the ages of the scholars in the various standards are above the average. Therefore, the blame must, to a large extent, rest on the shoulders of parents who do not send their children to school until they are seven or eight years of age. Faced with this handicap, the teachers, no matter how efficient, cannot perform miracles in order to prepare candidates for scholarships and free places within the age limit set down by the Education Department. If parents are satisfied with a primary course for their little ones, there is no more to be said on the point. If, however, they desire free secondary education, then they should send the children along at five years of age* The other alternative is for the Education Department to raise the age limit for free places and scholarship examinations, to 15 years. In the meantime parents would do well to start the children off on their educational career at an earlier age than at present obtains locally.